The US Role in the Central American Refugee Crisis

So, uhh, kids are being held in US detention camps under pretty horrific conditions.  There's currently a lot of debate centered around what the US should be doing for these refugees, the majority of which are from Central America.  As a historian of both the United States and Latin America, it bothers me to see one thing completely missing from these debates: the fact that the US has played a significant role in destabilizing certain parts of Latin America, particularly Central America.

Frankly, I think it's part of a bigger problem with our media's complete failure to give adequate historical context (or any, really) for the events that they cover.  But that's a subject for another post.

What I'm going to do here is give a brief overview of the US role in Latin America.  If you want a more detailed look into the US role in a specific Latin American country, one of my first posts on this blog explores the US role in Nicaragua during the 20th Century, focusing especially on the Nicaraguan Revolution and the subsequent US support of the Contras.

What I'll do here, however, is give a very broad overview, though I will zoom in a bit on a few key moments.  Enjoy!

(A quick note about sources: usually I source my posts pretty thoroughly, but a lot of the stuff I'm talking through here is stuff I read/learned from graduate school.  If you have any questions about the information I've provided here, or would like any book recommendations, feel free to ask!)

The Roots of US Involvement

 "Man, I wish I got my own countries to colonize, like Europe does. The US always gets the cool stuff!"

For about a hundred years after the founding of the United States, the US could only look to powerful European countries/empires like Britain, France, Spain, Portugal, and Russia with envy.  The US gradually grew in size and power during these hundred-ish years, but they weren't an empire the way the big European powers were, and therefore didn't have access to the same amount of resources or cheap (forced) labor.  This desire to expand is part of what led to the Mexican-American War, which is why we have the southwestern US today.

When it came to expanding beyond the continental US, however, there was a problem.  The European countries had colonized much of Africa and Asia.  Furthermore, the US hadn't developed a powerful enough military to carry out long-distance colonization of these far away places.  It could only watch as these European powers continued to profit off of the fruits of African and Asian colonization.

"Luckily" for the US (but not for the people down south), Latin America was right at its doorstep!  Most of Latin America had freed itself from Spanish and Portuguese control by the end of the late 1800s, yet few places were as developed as the US.  The US therefore had its own potential areas to exploit.  Even better, with Europeans being on the other side of the Atlantic, and focused on exploiting Africa and Asia, the US would have barely any competition!

Now, to be fair, there was mixed opinion on whether the US should actually do this or not.  Some said they shouldn't because Latin Americans should be seen as fellow independence-minded people who, just like the US, overthrew European exploitation; some opposed it less out of idealism and more because they felt, on a practical level, the US couldn't sustain such a project; others said the US shouldn't simply because they were so racist against Latin Americans they thought mingling with them would degrade US society and spread disease.  Some favored colonization out of a genuine, if misguided, desire to help; others openly only favored colonization because of a naked desire for profits.  Many simply didn't care one way or the other.

The Spanish-American War

I just wish there were someone around in the late 1800s to write

"that ain't it chief" in the letters to the editor (the comment section of its day).

Unfortunately, the imperialist side won out when the last territories of the Spanish empire, particularly Cuba, started fighting for independence.  There was a big push within the US to intervene in the conflict.  A strong anti-Spanish campaign propagated by politicians and spread by newspapers vilified the Spanish to no end (though, to be fair, much of it was quite justified).  Then, in February 1898, the USS Maine exploded in a Havana harbor, which ultimately sealed the deal (later investigations, however, showed that it was caused by a fire in the ammunition stocks of the ship, rather than Spanish mines).

A couple months later the Spanish-American War officially popped off between the two countries.  It was a brief war that only lasted from April 21st to August 13th, when the US won.  It marked not only the emergence of the US as an unofficial empire in nearby Latin America, but the end of Spain as a serious colonial power.  Part of the reason the US gave for fighting was that it was trying to "free" Cuba and other Spanish holdings.

In a foreshadowing of future affairs, Cuba did not really have say in the post-war talks.  Cuba was freed from being a Spanish colony, but became a "protectorate" (basically, a colony) of the United States.  In 1901 the US forced Cuba to integrate the Platt Amendment into their constitution, which forbade it from entering into treaties which "compromise Cuban independence" (which would be judged, of course, by the US), guaranteed US interests on the island, and gave the US authority to overthrow any Cuban leaders that it saw fit.  This last clause wasn't put there for show- the US intervened in Cuba multiple times from 1901 to the time of the Cuban Revolution in 1959. 

The Banana Wars

One of my most disappointing memories of grad school

was learning these weren't the weapons used during the Banana Wars.

When Teddy Roosevelt became president in 1901, he issued what he called the "Roosevelt Corollary" to the Monroe Doctrine.  For context, in 1823 president James Monroe and secretary of state John Quincy Adams drafted the Monroe Doctrine, which proclaimed that Europe couldn't create any new colonies in the Western Hemisphere and pledged US defense of any Latin American country facing European invasion.  It never led anywhere- the few times anyone from down south asked for help the US did nothing because it didn't have the power to- but it was a nice gesture.

The "Roosevelt Corollary", on the other hand, claimed the US could police Latin America through interventions in cases of "wrongdoing or impotence."

Long story short, this led to multiple US interventions in places like Panama, Nicaragua, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, and Honduras.  Usually it was the marines that were sent.  In some cases these interventions turned into occupations that lasted years, such as in the Dominican Republic (1916-1924), Nicaragua (1912-1933), Haiti (1915-1934), and Honduras (sporadically from 1903-1925).  The US also intervened in Cuba multiple times, as mentioned above, and even intervened briefly in Mexico in 1916, during the Mexican Revolution.  The US began to think of Latin America/the Caribbean as its "backyard."

These interventions were caused for a variety of reasons.  Usually it was some sort of combination of supporting pro-US factions during times of conflict, trying to quash domestic conflicts to create stability for US business interests, and good ol' fashioned bullying to get Latin American governments to bend to US will.  These interventions often squashed movements for democracy, civil rights, and other causes that could've helped create actual stability and prosperity for Latin Americans.

When Franklin D. Roosevelt became president, he ended the occupations in Latin America and instituted the "Good Neighbor" policy with Latin America.  The US withdrew militarily from the region and treated its neighbors with far more diplomatic respect.  Some historians attribute the Good Neighbor policy to genuine idealism, while others attribute it to more cynical causes, such as the idea that the US had already squashed enough social movements that they didn't need to stay occupying the region, or that it was done to get Latin America to side with the US if it entered WW2.  Whatever the reason(s), the Good Neighbor policy allowed Latin America a break from US intervention.

The Cold War Begins

No jokes here, just two goons you've probably never heard of who were responsible

for shifting US policy toward Latin America in a way that led to unimaginable suffering.

Then the Cold War happened.

As most of us know, World War 2 ended with tensions between the US and Soviet Union on what exactly the post-war world order would look like.  Both saw each other as an existential threat.  President Truman looked to contain communism to keep it from spreading.  In 1947 he created the CIA, National Security Council, and expanded/reorganized the US military.  When, in 1949, the Soviet Union successfully tested an atomic bomb and the Chinese communists overthrew the Chinese national government, tensions only further escalated.  The US was shook.

In 1952, Eisenhower won the presidential election.  He actually had a moderate foreign policy vision by Cold War standards, but he also had two people in his cabinet who were fervent Cold Warriors.  Head of the CIA Allen Dulles and secretary of state John Foster Dulles (pictured above) hated communism (or even just alleged "communists") more than they loved democracy or freedom.  In 1953 they helped overthrow the democratically elected, non-communist prime minister of Iran, Mohammad Mosaddegh, for nationalizing the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company in 1951.  They reinstalled the repressive shah (who would later be overthrown in the 1979 Iranian Revolution).

Then they turned their eyes to Guatemala.

Operation PBSUCCESS

"Surely the US, also being a democracy, will welcome me with open arms!"

In 1944 Guatemala had a mostly non-violent revolution that overthrew a US-backed military dictatorship.  In its place, Guatemalans establish an electoral democracy.  The first elected president was Juan Jose Arevalo, who helped further entrench democratic norms/institutions, legalized unions, instituted labor protections, and created literacy campaigns to help low-income and rural Guatemalans learn to read.  The US didn't like him for overthrowing their guy, but recognized he wasn't a communist, much less a Soviet puppet.

Then, in 1950, Jacobo Arbenz (who had served as defense minister under Arevalo) won the presidency.  He was to the left of Arevalo and expanded on what Arevalo had done, but he also had one big cornerstone of his campaign that hadn't been done before in Guatemala: land reform.  In 1952, Arbenz passed Ley 900, which appropriated unused land from large estates and gave it to the poor.  Much of the land was taken from the United Fruit Company, as it was the largest landholder in Guatemala.

(Fun side note: landowners were compensated for their land based on the amount they claimed the land was worth on their taxes.  Because these landed elite purposefully undervalued their land to avoid paying fair tax rates, they received way less than the land was worth and were pissed about it).

This was the final straw for the US.  In 1954, Arbenz was overthrown in a CIA-orchestrated coup.  The consequences were far-reaching for both Guatemala and the US.  For Guatemala, this created a spiraling of conflict in the country, as Guatemalans didn't take too kindly to their democratically elected government being replaced with a dictatorship.  They fought back, assassinating the US-chosen dictator in 1957, but the US insisted on appointing more military dictators.  This created a civil war in Guatemala that started in 1960 and didn't end until 1996.  Yes, that's right, nineteen ninety-friggin-six.  We'll get back to that later.

For the US, this (along with the 1953 coup in Iran) gave the US false confidence in coups.  I say "false confidence" because these coups only succeeded exactly because both places were not Soviet-connected communist countries run by militant ideologues.  Both Mosaddegh and Arbenz tried to de-escalate things, rather than militantly stand their ground; later investigations showed zero ties of either administration to the Soviets.  When the US actually ran into militant ideologues backed by the Soviets during later interventions, including the 1961 Bay of Pigs fiasco in Cuba, they often completely ate shit.

Revolution vs Reform

"Three cheers for scruffy beards!"

In 1959 the Cuban Revolution succeeded in overthrowing US-backed dictator Fulgencio Batista.  Long story short, Fidel Castro and his "barbudos" (bearded ones) came to power.  I'm not gonna talk in detail about Fidel's leadership here, as I already wrote a blog post a couple years back examining his complicated legacy.  For the purpose of this post, the main effect of the Cuban Revolution across Latin America was that it inspired much of the poor, the Indigenous, the working class, and the educated, for it showed that overthrowing US imperialism was possible (much of Latin America during this time was still ruled by US-backed dictatorships).  This optimism was called "fidelismo."

JFK came into office during the beginning of fidelismo.  JFK himself decided that these US-backed tyrants had to get their acts together.  Because of that he passed the Alliance for Progress, a large aid package for Latin American leaders in exchange for creating plans to help improve conditions for their citizens.  He believed reform would prevent revolution.

This noble thought failed, however, because it did nothing to fix the power structures of Latin America.  Military dictators with backing from the landed elite and Catholic church ran most of these countries, and spent most of the money on vanity projects (if not outright pocketing it) rather than on the promised programs.  The only real exceptions were Chile and Venezuela, which were both social democracies with pretty stable democratic institutions at the time.  They were used as models for the policy despite its overall failure, which allowed LBJ to continue it.  Nixon, however, ended the program.

Luckily for the US, Cuba wasn't very good at spreading revolution yet.  It made the mistake of buying into its own hype- Che really thought it was mostly just their group who overthrow Batista, rather than there being a number of factions from which Fidel just happened to come out on top.  From Che's analysis he developed "foco theory", the idea that a small group of revolutionaries can spark a greater flame of revolt.  This approach failed in Latin America, as Cuba naively thought it could just start revolutions abroad rather than assist already well-established revolutionary movements who had popular support (something they'd catch onto later, which greatly helped their success rate).

Basically, 1960s idealism petered out for both the US and Cuba in their own ways.

The Cold War Rises

"Sometimes, a [blatant disregard for human life] rises."

When Nixon came into office in 1968 he threw full support, including propaganda campaigns and military assistance, behind Latin American tyrants.  He did so without apology or any efforts to help average Latin Americans.  He also possibly helped directly overthrow the democratically elected socialist president of Chile, Salvador Allende, in 1973- there is debate as to whether the US facilitated the coup or just cheered from the sidelines.  Either way, they threw their full support behind the dictator Agosto Pinochet when he came to power.

When Carter came into office in 1976, he brought human rights into his foreign policy more than basically any Cold War president had, other than perhaps late-stage JFK.  He drastically reduced aid to countries with human rights issues, openly called for democracy in Latin America, and even chose not to intervene against revolutionary movements that had began popping up.  Unfortunately for Carter, 1979 was a rough year for the US.  The Iranian Revolution overthrew the US-backed shah and took Americans hostage, the Sandinistas overthrew the US-backed dictatorship of Anastacio Somoza to establish socialist democracy, and the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan.

The Iranian and Nicaraguan revolutions were inevitable and just happened to succeed during the Carter administration.  Republicans actively undermined/delayed the Iran hostage crisis in order to make Carter look weak.  The Afghanistan invasion would prove to be an disaster for the Soviets, much like Vietnam was for the US.  At the time, though, this spelled doom for the Carter presidency.  Reagan, who campaigned as the Cold War-iest of Cold Warriors, won the presidency in 1980.  His administration looked at human rights and democracy with the same level of apathy that people online view anti-piracy warnings.

He funded the Contras (counter-revolutionary forces) in Nicaragua by illegally selling arms to Iran.  It's worth noting there was nothing remotely democratic about the Contras- they were made up of people from the Anastacio Somoza dictatorship who had zero popular support among the general Nicaraguan population.  He also funded military dictatorships in Guatemala and El Salvador, among other places, despite their numerous, horrific atrocities.  Rapes, murdering of children, and cruel acts of torture were the norm for these regimes.  In some cases, entire villages were wiped out, with no exceptions made for children, the disabled, or elderly.

The Aftermath

 Shit, man, let's get some kittens in here to balance out the horror a bit.

By the end of the Cold War in 1991, Latin America was exhausted.  Especially Central America.  While South America suffered greatly under US-backed dictatorships in Brazil, Chile, Argentina, and elsewhere, those countries generally had more wealth, institutional stability, and other such advantages that helped lessen the long-term damage from these dictatorships.  Many people in these countries felt more like these dictatorships were an era of disruption, and the end of the Cold War signaled a return to normalcy (though, that said, hundreds of thousands were killed and/or disappeared, and many more tortured or threatened, so the effects shouldn't be taken lightly, either).

Central America was in shambles, however.  The civil war in El Salvador continued until 1992, while Guatemala's continued until 1996.  The Contras only backed down in Nicaragua because the US had strong-armed Nicaragua into voting for opposition candidate Violeta Chamorro in 1990 instead of Sandinista candidate Daniel Ortega in exchange for ending support for the Contras.  Honduras, while not wrecked by civil war, was used by the US as a base of operations during the Cold War, and the CIA violently suppressed dissent.  Panama was like Honduras up until its government grew so corrupt and unstable that it began to interfere with US interests, which caused Regan to turn on its leader, Noriega.

Only Costa Rica was spared, thanks in part to its strong democratic tradition that had miraculously found a peaceful middle ground between independence from the US while not agitating it.

To use Guatemala as a specific example of what Central America looked like, it's estimated that during the civil war about 200,000 people were killed.  That is a horrible number by itself, but even more horrible when put into the context of how small the country is.  The population of Guatemala in 1996 was about 10 million.  A UN truth commission found that 93% of the human rights violations conducted during the civil war were carried out about the military regime; only 3% were carried out by the leftist liberation movements, with the extra 4% carried out by other groups.

Poverty and Violence

I'm, uhh, gonna stick to this kitten thing if y'all don't mind.

The end of the Cold War in Central America, or even Latin America as a whole, didn't end all conflict.  Mostly, it lessened the US role in the region.  It's hard to say to what exact extent the US has played a role in the post-Cold War Latin America, as it's still too close to the present day for the Freedom of Information Act to disclose what we've done in recent years.  Still, it seems certain that it has played far less of a role without the threat of Soviet-backed communism to scare it into action.

Central Americans were left with a lot of questions.  How do we rebuild basically every institution of our society?  How will we govern, when we've known nothing but subjugation for so long?  What do we do with the people who served in these despotic, murderous regimes?  How do we create functional economies when so much people, resources, and ideas have been lost to violence for so long?  How do we go about healing psychologically from such traumatic experiences?

That's not something you recover from overnight.  These problems meant a power vacuum, which the drug cartels have taken advantage of.   On top of that, even in places where the drug cartels haven't reached, poverty is still extremely common.  These conditions, brought about in large part by the US role during the Cold War, are what sparked today's refugee crisis.

Closing Thoughts

A Guatemalan protest opposing government corruption in 2015.

Welp, there you have it.  US intervention has played a large role in the conditions that created today's refugee crisis.  Now, I don't wanna imply it was only the US who is responsible- the dictators of these countries, usually military men backed by the landed elite and Catholic church of their home countries, were the ones who wielded authority and made these decisions.  They used the US to help keep their grip on power just as the US used them to protect their Cold War interests.  It's impossible to say for sure whether which of these regimes could've survived without US support, but either way, both parties share blame.

On yet another note, I don't wannna imply that it's only been despair for Central America, either.  Most of these countries have become democracies in aftermath of the Cold War.  Many of them have built institutions that, while fragile and under-resourced, still show a level of progress despite the daunting challenges faced in the early 1990s.  Brave organizers have launched campaigns on everything from accountability projects against former despots, to commissions to find disappeared people, to political causes to help people.  There have even been former human rights activists and liberation movement leaders who have run for elected office.

The situation in Central America isn't hopeless.  The people of Central America aren't helpless.  Still, there are serious problems that the US helped create.  We need to recognize that reality, and think about that when we think about the refugees coming here from Central America.  "Tough luck, isn't my problem" doesn't apply here.

Thanks for reading.

End Game Analysis

What an experience Endgame was.  After over twenty movies, the sequel to Infinity War has finally wrapped up everything in the Marvel Cinematic Universe- or at least wrapped up this part of it.  The MCU will probably continue until we're wiped out by self-aware sex robots, but this phase brings to a close both the overarching threat of Thanos/the Infinity Stones and the character arcs of many of the founding Avengers.  That's a tall order, but it does so with a level of spectacle and entertainment that deserves respect.

And yet, I have no idea how I feel about the movie as a whole.

I supposed I should say that I felt entertained throughout most of it, and on occasion even felt some emotion.  Endgame is well-made in a lot of ways.  Yet, at the same time, the film covers so many different characters and tries to close so many arcs that the whole thing isn't exactly a coherent, unified vision where everything works.  The best made ensemble movies, such as Seven Samurai, manage to give each character adequate attention while also connecting everything to the main plot and theme(s) of the movie.  Endgame, with half a dozen times as many characters as those movies, doesn't have that luxury.

Because of that, it felt like there were too many moving pieces for me to call this entire movie great or bad or decent or disappointing or whatever else.  I don't know how to think of it as a whole.  So, instead of trying to force some grand analysis of Endgame, I will instead go into what did and didn't work for me.  There's plenty of each.

Of course, THIS MEANS THERE WILL BE SPOILERS.  Enjoy!

WHAT I LIKED

Scott Lang Waking Up

Maybe the real Paul Rudd has a quantum universe he hides in to prevent aging?

I felt mixed about the beginning of the 'five years later' part of Endgame.  You hear in passing that the loss of so many people ruined society, but you don't see it.  There's a sense of mourning in the air, but the consequences of the loss itself is not fully dramatized on screen.  The one scene we get is Captain America leading one support group meeting, and it's a good scene, but we never get a sense of how long Evans has been doing this or how it came about, or even if part of why he's leading the support group is because so many therapists and counselors got snapped away.  After this scene, the support group is never brought up again.

This is an odd way to bring up a sequence I like, but I mention my issue with the beginning because Scott Lang returning to the normal world does a great job of addressing the loss that I think the rest of the beginning of the movie could've done better.  Naturally, the sudden absence of 50% of life everywhere means that society would face a massive crisis- when doctors, farmers, teachers, firefighters, trade workers, social workers, sanitation workers, etc disappear, that's not something you recover from quickly.  The remaining 50% of people would face a collapse brought about by the sudden absence of so many people who do their part to help keep society running.

That's why I like this sequence.  Lang running through that abandoned San Francisco neighborhood, in which we only see a teenager on a bike left, shows a serious consequence of what such a mass loss of life would actually do to a city.  Then, when he eventually finds a memorial for some of the disintegrated, we see these monuments have countless mourners somberly remembering their loved ones.  It's been five years, but the gap left by the deceased is still there.  Lang desperately looks for his daughter's name, hoping with all his heart she isn't on the list, and because of Rudd's sincerity, I'm hoping she's still alive just as fiercely as he is.

Then we have the reunion.  What's so well-done is that the scene takes its time.  Scott and his daughter recognize each other, but it still takes her a moment to truly accept that's her dad standing at the door.  Meanwhile, you can see in Lang's eyes an indescribable joy at seeing his daughter, but also a shadow of melancholy for having missed an entire five years of her life.

This plot thread is great because it does exactly what this part of the movie should do.  It really looks at the weight of the destruction caused by the Thanos snap, and it does so without the sometimes irritating MCU need to almost always undercut a dramatic moment with jokes.

Revisiting Classic Moments

Actual photographed meeting of Disney executives for this portion of the movie.

The elevator scene from Winter Soldier.  The beginning of the first Guardians of the Galaxy movie.  The classic "Avengers assemble" moment from the first team movie.  The MCU is full of some truly iconic moments that will stay in the popular imagination for a long time.  In revisiting these scenes, the Russo Brothers made a move best described as... not "bold" per se, because milking nostalgia for all its worth is hardly a daring formula, but  ambitious.  The movie going back through these moments could have come off as cringy, but they did a good job of adding something interesting enough to most of these scenes that they didn't feel to me like fan service only for the sake of fan service.

Let's look at the elevator scene for example, perhaps the most celebrated moment from Winter Soldier.  Captain America and his all-American ass get onto the same elevator with the same people he fought before.  It's tense.  I honestly expected a remix of the first fight scene, which would've been a pretty transparently empty attempt to repeat that beloved moment just for the sake of repeating it.  Then Steve "America's Ass" Rogers whispers "heil HYDRA", which not only subverts the expectations of the scene, but shows how much he has changed.  The old, more innocent Captain Dummy-Thicc would've never thought to use such a tactic.

All of these revisited moments bring something similar to the table.  Professor Hulk trying to blend into the battle of New York by "smashing" things nearby fails hilariously, as Banner has now found an inner peace that makes him feels no need to lash out with destruction.  After years of treating the Hulk like a curse, he finally found a way to embrace his gift, which was really a part of himself the whole time.  These scenes are still shameless fan-service, but they're shameless fan service that are justified with interesting twists that allow us to see how far the characters have come in clever, entertaining ways.

Two of my favorite moments from the time travel to the past, however, had nothing to do with revisiting classic scenes.

Parental Reunions

I'm just glad they found a way to make The Dark World relevant.

A lot of online movie buffs have talked about how a recurring theme in the MCU is daddy issues.  Thor, Black Panther, and Star Lord all have them.  Perhaps none have been covered more throughout the MCU than Iron Man's, however.  In the early movies, Iron Man recalls how distant and uncaring his father seemed.  Yet there had always been some ambiguity, as well.  Toward the end of Iron Man 2, Stark discovers his father's secret plans for the future, revealing his dad had a lot of hope for his son despite their issues.  In Civil War he recalls the last time he saw his parents before they left, then turns on Captain America and Bucky when he finds out the latter killed them.

Things change after that for Tony, however.  He becomes a surrogate father to Peter Parker in the first MCU Spiderman movie, then a biological father in this movie.  In the former he jokes that he's become like his father; in the latter, it's confirmed.  He values his daughter more than anything and wants to be there for her, yet duty calls.  Just like his father, he cannot put the good of the world aside for his own happiness.  So, when this scene finally comes, Stark talks to his dad with a profound understanding of the greater good vs personal happiness question that is at the heart of every good superhero movie.  It's a wonderful moment that brings Stark's relationship with both his father and himself full-circle.

My other favorite parental moment is, of course, Thor's reunion with his mother.  Thor has had quite the character journey throughout the MCU movies.  Even after the events of the first Thor movie got him to think about more than himself and his lust for battle, he always had a confident bravado to him.  It makes sense- he is the strongest Avenger next to Hulk and Captain Marvel, and never experienced a hard personal failure the way other heroes in the MCU had.  He loses his parents in Dark World and Ragnorak, but both are outside of his control; his mom dies when he isn't around while his dad basically dies of old age.  But in Infinity War he is powerless to stop the loss of half of his people, including his brother Loki and friend Heimdall.  Then, after immense pain brought about by all he has lost, he finally gains Stormbreaker and defeats Thanos.

Yet, due to Thor's need to gloat in the moment of victory, Thanos still manages to snap his fingers.

That would mess anyone up.  There's a reason Thor is the most sullen Avenger at the very start of the film, and why the beheading of Thanos brings him no joy.  There's a reason why he's retreated from the world after the weight of his failure and grief come crashing down on him after revenge brings him nothing.  He is completely lost.  His mother recognizes that, and gives him the support and guidance only a loving parent can.  It helps snap Thor out of his funk, restoring his warrior spirit and allowing him to fight Thanos in the biggest rematch since Conor McGregor vs Nate Diaz 2.

Captain America Wielding Thor's Hammer

FUCK. YES.

I don't have anything thoughtful to say, this moment was just fucking awesome.

The End of Tony Stark and Steve Rogers

Feeling cute rn, might give a satisfying end to the journey of MCU's two biggest characters idk~

I remember at the end of Infinity War how surprised I was at the fact they actually had Thanos win.  When Bucky evaporated, my jaw actually dropped.  The grim, somber silence was the perfect choice for letting the scene unfold.  A couple supporting characters popped and I felt a deep sense of surprise, despair, and grief for all those we were losing.  Then Black Panther disappeared, and I thought to myself "aren't there already rumors of a second Black Panther movie in the works?  Hmm, maybe his sister will take over!"  Then more and more prominent characters disappeared, and I realized that this is a fucking comic book series that could never let something like this stand.

I was conflicted.  I loved Infinity War, and thought the ending was a bold choice even with the certainty everyone would come back.  But the MCU in general has a problem with real consequences.  Heroes almost always get their cake and eat it too, with ideas of "sacrifice" often being given lip service without actually happening in the plot.  Even when there are the occasional consequences, such as the loss of Quicksilver in Age of Ultron, the losses never come up again (I actually forgot he existed until Googling images for this article).  I worried this movie would find a fun, light-hearted way to undo the snap that would only change things on the surface.

I think in some ways that did happen, but it certainly didn't with the conclusion of Iron Man and Captain America's arcs.  Perhaps the two most important MCU characters up to this point, each could be argued to be the foundation of the MCU Avengers team.  Iron Man was the first superhero of the modern day in the MCU and was the first to help SHIELD with the Avengers Initiative, while Captain America was chronologically the first superhero and had a strong moral core that inspired others long after he became frozen in the ice.  Despite their butting of heads, their leadership and heroism formed the basis of the MCU Avengers as we know them.

That's why I loved seeing them each get a great send off.  I was devastated Tony died.  But, in a movie series where examples of bad fathers come up so often, culminating in big-bad Thanos adopting Gamora & Nebula and naming his followers Children of Thanos, it made sense that Tony, both the father of the Avengers team and a literal father, would counter Thanos's example of fatherhood with his own empathetic, self-sacrificing version.

"We don't trade lives" is the perfect quote to sum up the Avengers philosophy, and it's no coincidence that Captain America is the one to say it in the previous movie.  As already stated, he is the moral core of the team.  Like Stark, Rogers has done nothing but give and give, at immense cost to himself.  Perhaps no Avenger had consciously chosen to give up more to do what's right before the end of this movie.  With Thanos out of the way and no detectable threat left to the universe, it was wonderful to see Rogers get the life he so richly deserved.  It was also nice to see him pass off the shield to Sam Wilson.

Thanks for the great memories, fellas.

WHAT I DIDN'T LIKE

Comically Depressed Thor

"Thanos is evil? That's just, like, your opinion, man."

I dealt with a lot growing up.  Fortunately, my coping mechanism didn't involve me repeating past family demons like substance abuse, but I did become both a people-pleaser and a class clown.  The thing that people don't get about class clowns is that we often feel like we have to keep entertaining people, because if we are sincerely ourselves no one will like us.  For me, that meant until about my early to mid-twenties I couldn't be vulnerable, and if I started to become sincere, I had to find moments to undercut that sincerity with humor.

Now, I think humor in moderation can be incredibly helpful as a coping mechanism.  Realizing over the past few years how much I used humor to sometimes cope in unhealthy ways doesn't mean I've avoided comedy/jokes by any means.  Everyone needs to laugh and be silly sometimes, and humor during times of crisis can be a life-saver.  At the same time, however, we shouldn't use it as a shield to avoid vulnerability or reckoning with our traumas.

All of this is to say that I felt post-time skip Thor's pain was used far more as a joke than it should've been.  To be clear, I'm not saying Thor's scenes should've only been serious, melancholy explorations of all the grief and guilt he carried with him.  This is a comic book movie meant for entertainment.  At the same time, though, it seemed like almost every line and every action from Thor up until he sees his mom was meant to evoke laughs.  On top of that, during the few moments where we got a glimpse of what was underneath, there would be an immediate goofy follow up right after that made sure the vulnerability wouldn't stay.

I felt intensely embarrassed for Thor throughout the movie.  Not because there's anything embarrassing about being fat or depressed, but because the film treats this stuff as a punchline.  I would've loved to have seen a more earnest exploration of his pain that didn't feel the need to constantly undercut any emotional depth with constant jokes, as if the filmmakers were trying to say "hey, we don't wanna be unhappy for even one full minute, here are some jokes to avoid emotional discomfort of any kind!"

I know I've said this twice already, but I really wanna emphasize that I'm not looking for Thor to be dark and brooding in this movie.  This isn't Nolan's Dark Knight trilogy.  But other superhero movies like Spiderman 2, X-Men First Class, and Wonder Woman show you can be sincere while still having a good time.  It would've been nice to see more of that for Thor in this movie.

Edgy Hawkeye

"I've changed, Natasha.  You can tell by my new haircut and the fact I use a sword now."

I thought the beginning scene of the movie was great, and I've never even found Hawkeye that interesting of a character.  It shows how devastating the snap was for him, and lets you imagine how many other people probably had their entire families except themselves snuffed out by the impartial roulette of who did and didn't die.  You can only imagine how much grief that causes him.  It makes sense that after such a traumatic event he might spiral downward in an ugly direction.

Later we hear from Black Widow that Hawkeye is killing people.  The Avengers don't wanna confront him, but it seems his killing isn't slowing down, and at some point they'll have to do something to stop him.  It makes for a good conflict.  His motivations are clearly understood- they're not justified (losing your entire family doesn't make most people mass muderers, even if the people you're killing are bad), but it makes sense.  They could've fleshed out his journey from grief-stricken to killer more, but in such a crowded movie, it makes sense to not prioritize it.

Then hope for getting everyone back is found, and Black Widow shows up to the scene of another Hawkeye killing spree and... sorta lightly chides him but otherwise just tells him about their plan.  It doesn't come up again in any significant way whatsoever until Black Widow and Hawkeye are battling for who gets to die on Vormir, with Hawkeye saying "I've done bad things!!1!11!!"  Which is true, but in the past Hawkeye and Black Widow have bonded over their dark, morally ambiguous past before.  You could remove everything about edgy-murder Hawkeye from the movie and the Vormir scene could've played out exactly the same.

This sequence should've either been more fleshed out or removed entirely.  In such a crowded movie, it may have been better to do the former, and just let the Avengers find him sad and forelorn like they do almost everyone else at the start of the movie.

But, going back to Vormir...

Death of Black Widow

 *insert that one GIF of that one guy saying "haha, this sucks man" here*

So, how about the fact that the place where the first female Guardian of the Galaxy died also became the place where the first female Avenger died?

I know the automatic response to this is "she wanted to atone for her past of violence and death!"  And, yeah, this is certainly one way for her to achieve that.  However, one thing you learn in a creative writing class is that killing a character to "redeem" them is the easy shortcut countless beginning writers will take.  There are many alternatives.  You only need to watch almost any anime ever made to see a villain's life get spared so that s/he may repent for what they've done and maybe even become a member of the team.

As a matter of fact, this is the approach Black Widow has taken at the beginning of the movie.  She's directing the team from the Avengers headquarters, making sure that even in the face of such grief and loss (not to mention disaster brought about by so many disappearances) that the Avengers continue doing what they can to help the world.  Seeing a woman who has helped save the world on the frontlines now transition to doing the same thing in a position of leadership was pretty cool.

It's a shame they have to do that, especially when Hawkeye, could've also sacrificed himself to protect the universe, further reinforcing the theme of fathers sacrificing themselves to create a better world for both their families and everyone else as a whole.  It could've helped make the movie feel slightly more cohesive by hinting at what Stark would do later.

But, this could've been more forgivable if the other prominent woman of Endgame were give more to work with...

Captain Marvel's Absence

"I'm here to kick ass and take names... in other parts of the galaxy, off-screen, unrelated to this movie."

I'd write a lot about Carol Danvers' role in Endgame, except there isn't much to write about.  In a movie where only two female Avengers are given a prominent role, it's a pretty bad look for one to die and another to disappear.  To be fair, if you count Nebula she had a decent role in the movie as she learns to further embrace her change to the good side, but that's just not enough in a movie where so many male characters get so much attention.

Valkyrie Becoming Queen

How is Tessa Thompson not in literally everything

Man, I love Valkyrie (and also Tessa Thompson in general).  She was my favorite part of Ragnorak next to Thor himself, not only for her badassery and drunken charm but because of the surprisingly substantive arc she had throughout the movie.  She goes from someone struggling with alcoholism to someone who faces her demons in order to help defend her forsaken people.  Seeing her become queen at the end of Endgame should've been an awesome moment.

And yet... it wasn't.

The problem is that this isn't something that has been built toward at all.  Her character arc in Ragnorak is her learning to face her fears and care again; it's good, but has nothing to do with leadership abilities.  She is then entirely absent from Infinity War (we aren't even told in the movie that she and half of the Asgardians survive).  Then, in Endgame, she first shows up to tell the Avengers that Thor is now depressed, then doesn't reappear until the giant battle scene toward the end.

I love the idea of Valkyrie being queen of Asgard (or the idea of Tessa Thompson being queen of Earth in real life), but this moment feels so hollow because in no way does any movie in the entire MCU canon build or even hint toward it at all.  Hell, even if Valkyrie had been shown in both Ragnorak and Endgame on the battlefield issuing orders and giving a quick inspiring speech at some point, we'd at least have something to go off of.  Or if during Infinity War there were a quick scene of her being the one to inspire the survivors who escaped Thanos after the scene of the movie.  Or even make it so that she is the one who convinces Thor to rejoin the Avengers in this movie.

But, no, we're given none of that.  We have nothing building toward this moment at all.  Thor could've given the crown to Krog and nothing about it would've changed.  I'm still excited to see Valkyrie be queen of Asgard, but the lack of set up leaves a sour taste in my mouth.

Closing Thoughts

We've seen the last of at least two of the big three as superheros.

Whatever the shortcomings of this movie, it was an entertaining ride with a satisfying blend of charming character moments, big spectacle, and even some occasional strong emotional moments.  It's wild to think about what has happened in eleven years. I mostly only knew of Iron Man from all the references the rapper Ghostface Killah made to him, and I remember everyone (myself included) being skeptical that the first Avengers movie would work out or that the MCU would last much further past it.

The MCU has changed the cinematic landscape.  Movie snobs used to complain when movies got turned into a trilogy; now movies have interconnected cinematic universes.  Now movie series can go on indefinitely, as we've seen with franchises like the Fast & Furious movies and even DC's movies.  It'll be interesting to see what Hollywood can do with this new approach in the long run.  Perhaps directors who grew up on the MCU will be able to take all the strength of Marvel's movies and infuse them with their own strengths that'll make this current MCU chapter look rookie by comparison.

Regardless of how I felt about Endgame, these eleven years have given me some great memories.  For all the MCU's faults, they've created some damn good movies and even all-time great superhero movie moments ("briiing meee Thaaanooos!" is one of my all-time favorite moments of superhero spectacle, and the MCU is also filled with many intimate character moments that I love).  Here's hoping the future of the MCU brings just as many treasures.

Thanks for reading!